The Royalist - Move Over Kate....

Move Over Kate....

Written by Joanne Leyland

Thursday, 02 October 2008

Kate Middleton’s brother has given his first newspaper interview. But don’t expect any revelations about his famous sister, for this relates primarily to cakes....and not even wedding cakes at that.

It’s been suggested that 21-year-old James is keen to be famous and even resented the fact that, unlike his sisters Kate and Pippa, he rarely if ever featured in the press.

Thanks in part to those pictures of him living it up at private parties, this level of anonymity has disappeared.

Interviewed in today's Daily Telegraph for a feature on six 'posh' entrepreneurs, the man who looks destined to become the brother-in-law of the future king has been promoting his business, The Cake Kit Company.

This welcome (and free) newspaper promotion of his company comes in the same week his parents Party Pieces business received yet more publicity thanks to the inclusion of 26-year-old Kate – an employee - in the company’s brochure.

Like Kate, James too works with Party Pieces, the company distributing a disposable caking tin which he uses in his daily work.

Despite recent tabloid coverage depicting him as a 'wild' party animal, James says he doesn’t go clubbing, instead choosing to spend his free nights at "supper parties".

Referring to the premature end of his studies at Edinburgh University, he explains: "Within a few weeks I knew I wasn’t where I wanted to be. I said to myself I would see a year out in case it got good. But I was always looking for business ideas."

His life having moved on, James admits: "It’s awkward going back up to Edinburgh to see my old friends, because I’m not on the same wavelength."

Ultimately, James ditched his studies and set up The Cake Kit Company in 2007. The concept of the business is one which would likely win the approval of the traditionalist Prince of Wales: to encourage children to get into the kitchen.

Asked about the help he’s received from his parents, Michael and Carole, James says "they weren't going to take me on just because I was their son. I had to get a bank loan initially."

The company also helps make easier the process of baking party cakes, providing customers with the necessary equipment to produce novelty cakes.

Suffice to say James wasn't asked whether he's destined to produce what would be the most illustrious cake of most recent times: the wedding cake of HRH Prince William of Wales and Miss Catherine Middleton.